Rebel Trade

by Don Pendleton

  Windhoek was established as an Afrikaner settlement in 1840, likely chosen for the local hot springs that led aboriginal inhabitants to call it Otjomuise, “place of steam.” Today, those springs lie near the city’s center and remain a draw for locals and tourists alike. Three hundred thousand people occupy the capital and its thirty-odd suburbs, seven percent of Namibia’s overall population. Highways linking Windhoek to the cities of Gobabis, Okahandja and Rehoboth were built with desert flash-flooding in mind, but the capital’s main drag—Independence Avenue, formerly Kaiserstraße—did not get its first coat of asphalt until 1928.

  Germany had claimed Namibia—then German South-West Africa—in 1884, to forestall British incursions. When Herero and Namaqua tribesmen took up arms against the occupying army in 1904, General Lothar von Trotha had launched a three-year genocidal campaign that claimed 110,000 native lives within three years, many killed by systematic poisoning of desert wells. South Africa occupied the territory in 1915 and maintained its notorious racist standards until 1988, when independence climaxed two decades of armed rebellion by the South West Africa Peoples’ Organization. Today, SWAPO is Namibia’s dominant political party and a full member of the Socialist International, prone to denial of alleged human rights violations. While nominally allied with neighboring Angola, SWAPO has also granted sanctuary of a sort to Angolan rebels battling for radical change in their homeland, including independence for the small north-Angolan province of Cabinda.

  And some of them were pirates, too, supporting their movement by ransoming ships and their cargoes collected at sea. Hal Brognola had briefed Bolan on the problem, stateside, before Bolan had caught a transatlantic flight from Newark Liberty International Airport to Portugal’s Lisbon Portela Airport, and on from there to Windhoek. Attacks at sea included raids on U.S. merchant vessels, most recently the MV Cassowary with her captain and five crewmen murdered.

  Piracy aside, the rebel movement also filled its coffers by importing illegal drugs from South Africa. Dagga—marijuana—was the drug of choice for most Namibian users, though cocaine, heroin and LSD were also making inroads, and legislative efforts to hike prison terms for drug addicts had failed in the face of widespread public opposition. That was good for the smugglers, since prohibition kept street prices inflated, and the insurrectionists who peddled drugs for profit evidently saw no conflict with their high-minded ideals.

  Bolan himself had never been a blue-nosed moralist where drugs or any other substance was concerned. By most standards he was a libertarian, but he had also learned firsthand that vicious predators infested every form of traffic in forbidden goods and services. The profits gleaned from dagga sales loaded the weapons pirates used to hijack ships at sea, primed the explosives left by terrorists to murder innocent civilians and equipped assassins for attacks on democratically elected leaders.

  He would stop that, if he could.

  But first, he needed hardware.

  * * *

  ASSER TJIRIANGE RAN an import business in the Katutura suburb of Windhoek. According to the guidebook Bolan carried, Katutura translated from the Herero language as “the place where we do not want to live.” Created in 1961 for resettlement of blacks uprooted from the present-day Hochland Park sector, Katutura had overcome its stigma as a ghetto during recent years, boasting small but decent homes and the ten-thousand-seat Sam Nujoma Stadium.

  Tjiriange’s shop was located in Katutura Central, on a short street featuring a jeweler, two automotive garages, a fast-food restaurant and a cut-rate furniture store. Ostensibly, Tjiriange imported native art and handicrafts from Angola, Botswana and South Africa, selling them at marked-up prices to collectors in Windhoek and overseas. And while, in fact, he earned a living from that trade, it was his other line of work that let him buy a mini mansion in the formerly all-white enclave of Pioneer Park.

  Tjiriange’s other trade involved illicit arms.

  * * *

  NAMIBIA IS A WELL-ARMED country. Police estimate that some 260,000 firearms reside in civilian hands, though less than 98,000 are legally registered under the nation’s Arms and Ammunition Act. Authorities receive an average five hundred applications for gun licenses each week, many of which are denied. The street price for an AK-47 rifle averages $250, although military-style weapons and imitations of the same cannot be purchased legally without a special license. On the other hand, no permits are required to carry pistols in public places, concealed or otherwise. But the impact of those weapons on society is difficult to judge, since Namibian authorities stopped reporting homicide statistics in 2004.

  None of which meant anything to Bolan as he went shopping for hardware in Katutura. Tjiriange greeted him like a long-lost friend, alerted by a phone call to expect a special customer with ample cash in hand. He locked the shop’s front door and hung a closed sign on it before leading Bolan through the aisles of wicker furniture, carved figurines and other items offered to the general public, to an office at the rear. From there, a door opened behind a rack of jackets hanging in a narrow closet, granting them admission to a second showroom, hidden from the public eye.

  Bolan knew what he wanted, more or less, but looked at everything Tjiriange had for sale. In addition to the AK-47 with its GP-30 launcher and the sleek Beretta 92, he also took a Dragunov sniper rifle chambered in 7.62x54 mmR, fitted with a PSO-1 telescopic sight. Although uncertain whether he’d be making any long shots, Bolan still preferred to have an extra weapon and not need it, than to miss it in a crunch and find himself outgunned.

  And, as an afterthought, he picked up half a dozen Mini MS-803 mines with radio-remote ignition switches, the South African equivalent of Claymores manufactured in the States.

  He paid the tab with cash acquired before he’d left the States.

  Once he left the shop, the next matter on Bolan’s mind was a meeting with a target who had no idea The Executioner existed, much less that he’d flown to Namibia specifically for their impending tête-à-tête. Forewarned, the man might have tried to leave the city—or the country—and that didn’t fit with Bolan’s plans.

  One unexpected meeting coming up.

  Whether the stranger Bolan sought survived the meet or not would be entirely up to him, depending on his level of cooperation and the prospect that he’d keep his mouth shut afterward.

  On second thought, his chances didn’t look that good at all.

  * * *

  NITO CHIVUKUVUKU MISSED the nightlife in Luanda, where five million people thronged the streets, not counting foreign visitors, and anything you might imagine or desire was readily available for sale. Windhoek, one-fifth the size of the Angolan capital, had opportunities for sin, of course, but they were limited, mundane. It was like hoping for a giant, super-modern shopping mall and being stuck inside a rural village’s pathetic general store.

  The bottom line: Chivukuvuku wished he could go home.

  The other bottom line: if he went home, he likely would be dead within a month.

  He had worn out his welcome in Luanda and—to be honest—throughout his homeland generally. The Angolan National Police would love to lay their hands on Chivukuvuku, and he did not relish the idea of screaming out his final breaths inside some filthy dungeon. When he went home, if he ever went home, it would be as a heroic liberator of his people, honored for his sacrifice on their behalf.

  And yes, beloved by all the ladies, too.

  But in the meantime, there was work to do in Windhoek and along the cruel coast of Namibia. So close to home, and yet so far away. Until the final day of victory, there would be guns and drugs to smuggle, ships to loot or hold for ransom, building up the MLF’s war chest. And if he skimmed some off the top, who in his right mind would suggest that any soldier in the field should be denied a taste of pleasure, every now and then?

  On this night, for instance.

  He had start
ed off at the Ten Bells, a pub on Werner List Street that displayed no bells, much less the ten it advertised. From there, glowing from the Starr African rum inside him, he was headed for the brothel run by Madame Charmelle Jorse on Sam Nujoma Street. The night was warm, as always, and the four-block walk would sober him enough to make sure that he chose a pretty girl and not a discount special.

  Buzzed as he was, and looking forward to the climax of his evening. Chivukuvuku paid no real attention to the traffic flowing past him. He kept his distance from the curb, where a less steady man might lurch into the street and spoil his happy ending. If questioned afterward, Chivukuvuku could not honestly have said he saw the white Volkswagen pass him by and turn into a cross street one block farther south. In terms of model, year or who was at the wheel, he would have been a hopeless case.

  If anyone had asked.

  As it turned out, however, no one would.

  When Chivukuvuku reached the corner where the Volkswagen had turned unnoticed, he was mildly startled by the vision of a white man dressed in casual attire. Mildly surprised, because he knew, on some level, that roughly one-sixth of the city’s populace was white. And he saw them every so often, particularly if his dealings took him to the central business district, but he rarely met a white man on his nightly prowls.

  Not quite anticipating trouble, Chivukuvuku edged a little closer to the curb, putting some extra space between the white man and himself, still conscious of the traffic passing on his left. A tight spot, viewed from one perspective, but he had survived in tighter and emerged the winner.

  Besides, Chivukuvuku had a gun.

  So did the white man, as he soon found out. One moment, as they stood at the corner, waiting for the light to change, there was a safe six feet between them. The next, he saw the white man moving, felt the firm touch of a gun’s muzzle against his ribs.

  “It’s silenced,” the stranger said, speaking perfect English. “You can come with me or have a fall in traffic. Time to choose.”

  “Who are you? What do you—”

  “I’ll ask the questions, somewhere else. Time’s up.”

  “All right! I’ll come with you.”

  A hand snaked underneath Chivukuvuku’s lightweight jacket, found his gun and made it vanish.

  “This way,” the white man said, steering Chivukuvuku to their right, along a side street that seemed suddenly deserted. When they reached a white car and the right rear door was already opened for him, his abductor said, “Climb in and take a nap.”

  “A nap?” Chivukuvuku was confused, as well as frightened.

  “In,” the stranger said, his silenced pistol prodding.

  Chivukuvuku stooped to do as he was told, felt something strike his skull behind one ear and tumbled into darkness streaked by shooting stars.

  * * *

  THE YOUNG ANGOLAN REBEL didn’t want to die. That much was clear when he awoke, bound to a tree with duct tape, on the outskirts of a Windhoek suburb curiously called Havana. There’d been no time for The Executioner to rent a private space, and he had not believed that there would be a need.

  His business with the captive wouldn’t take that long.

  “I only have three questions,” Bolan said. “The first—where can I find your boats?”

  “What boats?” the prisoner replied. “I don’t know—”

  The Beretta coughed. Its bullet clipped the target’s left earlobe. His mouth fell open and a cry of pain was building in his throat when Bolan plugged it with the pistol’s silence.

  “I don’t like torture,” he informed the prisoner. “I’ve never trusted it, and, frankly, don’t have time to do it properly this evening. I’ll ask again and you can live or die, okay?”

  The rebel tried to nod, then settled for a grunt that Bolan took for his agreement. With the silencer removed, the young man made a gagging sound, then spat, careful to turn his face away from Bolan as he did so.

  “So? The boats,” Bolan said.

  “They’re upriver from Durissa Bay,” his prisoner replied. “About a mile inland.”

  “How many men will I find there?”

  “It varies. Twenty-five or thirty usually. Sometimes more, sometimes less.”

  It sounded reasonable, but Bolan had no way to verify it short of visiting the site, which he planned to do tomorrow night. First, though, there was more shopping to be done in Windhoek. Final preparations to be made.

  “Last question,” he informed the hostage. “Where’s the MLF headquarters in Windhoek?”

  “What do you want with—”

  “Simple question, simple answer,” Bolan warned him.

  The taped-up man gave him an address in the Hakahana suburb, translated in Bolan’s travel guide as hurry up.

  And that was sound advice.

  “You said three questions, eh? So, can I go now?”

  “What’s your name?” Bolan asked.

  “Nito—”

  The Beretta came down on the man’s temple and temporarily silenced him. Bolan didn’t want the rebel running back to his comrades, telling tales. This way, when he was found, likely in a few days at the earliest, it would confuse them, maybe even bring some heat down on his fellow rebels from police. What Bolan absolutely didn’t need was anyone alerting his intended targets as to where he might be going next.

  Not Hakahana. Later, certainly, but not this night, and not tomorrow.

  In the morning, he would have to find the smallest watercraft available. Something inflatable that could be packed into the backseat of the Volkswagen, or maybe strapped atop its roof. Failing that, he’d have to rent or buy a trailer, make himself just that much more conspicuous. His first concern was hanging on to the advantage of surprise.

  “They won’t expect you,” Brognola had told him, as they walked among the graves at Arlington, with slate-gray clouds hiding the sun. “All over Africa, the pirates are convinced that they’re untouchable.”

  A grave mistake.

  They hadn’t reckoned on the Executioner—an oversight that could turn out to be their last.

  A room was waiting for him at the Hilton Windhoek, near the city’s zoo. Matt Cooper’s platinum AmEx would cover it, and if he fell asleep with lions roaring in the neighborhood, so be it. It would prove he was in Africa.

  In Bolan’s war, the names and faces changed, along with the landscapes, but the Evil never varied. Everywhere he went, some individual or group was hell-bent on destroying others or coercing them into some action that repulsed them, something that would push their so-called civilized society a little closer to the brink of bloody anarchy. Sometimes he felt as if he were the only plumber in a vast metropolis where every pipe not only leaked, but threatened to explode and flood the place at any moment. Rushing here and there with meager tools, he fought to stem the tide, his work unrecognized by those he saved.

  And sometimes Bolan failed.

  He couldn’t rescue every sheep from the innumerable wolves stalking the flock on seven continents. Or scratch Antarctica and make it six; the basic problem still remained. Unless he could be everywhere at once, shadowing every man, woman and child on Earth, he couldn’t do it all.

  And Evil never died.

  No matter how many of its foot soldiers Bolan liquidated, Evil always reared its head again, invulnerable to his bullets, his grenades, his blade.

  So, what?

  Spotty religious training from his childhood told Bolan that even God could not destroy Evil—or that he chose to let it run amok for reasons left mysterious. In fact, if you believed the words of “holy writ,” He had created Evil in the first place as some kind of crazy test for humankind that never seemed to end.

  Bolan didn’t know if that was true. More to the point, he didn’t care.

&nb
sp; His job as a committed warrior was to face Evil where it appeared and beat it down, or die in the attempt. Another round would start tomorrow, and it could go either way.

  At the moment he needed sleep.

  And time to plan his moves.

  Chapter 3

  Erongo Region, Namibia, Present

  The NSV machine gun’s sound was thunderous, eclipsing the rattle of Kalashnikovs and the pop-pop of handguns. Bolan swept the pirate camp from west to east and back again, night-vision goggles pushed up on his forehead to prevent him being blinded by the weapon’s awesome muzzle-flashes. Slugs the size of fat cigar stubs, each weighing one-ninth of a pound, ripped through men, tents and anything else before them, traveling at half a mile per second.

  It was devastating—but it couldn’t last.

  The NSV devours ammunition at a cyclic rate of eight hundred rounds per minute, and the standard belt holds only fifty rounds. Gone in four seconds, give or take. A way around that problem is the use of non-disintegrating steel belts with open links, assembled in ten-round segments using a cartridge as an interlink. While ammo belts could stretch for miles, in theory, MG barrels warp under prolonged full-auto fire, and standard ammo boxes only hold 250 belted rounds.

  Which should be running out for Bolan’s weapon any second.

  The sudden ringing silence was a shocker. Bolan had an instant choice to make: start searching for another box of ammo without knowing where it was, or run like hell. One choice meant almost certain death; the other was a gamble with no guarantees at all.

  The Executioner had always been a gambler.

  While a reload for the NSV might prove elusive, Bolan knew exactly where to find the starter button for the pirate speedboat he presently occupied alone. Grabbing his AK-47 on the run, he fired a short burst at the vessel’s mooring line, then dropped into the pilot’s chair and gunned the engine into roaring life. He ignored the fuel gauge, since he didn’t have the time nor the means to fill the gas tank, even if the needle fell on empty. Bolan had a need for speed, as some old movie put it, and it was time to split.